


Outside Perspective

by RedTeamShark



Series: With My Little Eye [5]
Category: Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter/Funhaus RPF
Genre: Alcohol, F/M, Implied Sexual Content, oc child - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-18
Updated: 2016-08-18
Packaged: 2018-08-09 13:56:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,895
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7804450
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RedTeamShark/pseuds/RedTeamShark
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Geoff has some suspicions and needs an outside perspective. Luckily, he has someone to bounce ideas off of.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Outside Perspective

He’s home for dinner, the first time in almost a week that he’s been at his house when the evening meal is served. His daughter, smiling with a missing tooth ( _when did she lose that?_ Geoff wonders. _When did I stop being able to notice the little things?_ ) tells him excitedly about her day at school. His wife’s hand is on his during the entire meal, cool fingertips brushing along his palm as he smiles and listens to his daughter talk about her day.

Geoff sits down with her after dinner, helping her through the simple math homework she has, then offering to read a story with her. She insists on reading to him, and another pang of lost time shoots through him as she begins to confidently convey the story to him from the couch. He wraps his arms around her extra tight when she finishes, heaping praises on her while she giggles and tells him that it’s a baby book and easy to read.

 _Second grade…_ he thinks with a sigh as his daughter hurries off to brush her teeth and get ready for bed at her mother’s insistence. _Second grade and soon she’ll be in middle school and where am I in all this? Where am I in her life?_ He’s pulled from his thoughts by a hand on his shoulder, squeezing lightly.

“Go tuck her in,” Griffon instructs gently, smiling and nodding. “Read her a bedtime story, she’s been clamoring every night for you to read her one in your special voices.” He stands, hands settling on his wife’s slim hips, lips meeting hers briefly before he’s pushed away. “Geoff, read her a story. See her while you can, okay? I’ll wait for you.”

It’s all the prodding he needs, meeting his daughter outside the bathroom when she opens the door—now wearing shorts and one of his old t-shirts, her clothes from the day in the hamper—and offering his arm with a mock-formal bow. “May I escort the young ma’am to her bedtime?” He questions, grinning at her giggle, setting his hand over hers when she takes his arm. It’s an old game, one he’s thrilled to see she hasn’t quite grown out of.

He settles her into bed, brushing her hair back from her forehead and planting a kiss there before tucking her in. Her eyes stray to the clock on her wall before meeting his, the question already forming on her lips. “Is there time for you to read a story to me?”

For just a moment, he taps his chin in thought, looking from the clock to his daughter to the bookshelf. “A short one.” He agrees, standing and stepping over to the shelf, turning back sharply when she begins to clap. “But only if you stay in bed while I do it. It’s time to go to sleep, okay?”

She’s quick to agree, pulling her hands back under the blankets, scooting over just a bit to make room for him when he selects a book and sits down. He lets her choose which story from inside the thick fairy tale tome, listing options and smiling a little at her selection. “But Daddy?” His daughter questions, looking up with wide, innocent eyes. “Can you tell the _good_ ending?”

And he smiles and agrees, weaving the tale of foolhardy children who go wandering into the woods alone, voicing each character with a different tone and inflection. He cackles with the witch, mentally rewriting the story to give his daughter the ‘good’ ending, the foolhardy children being tricked into becoming the evil witch’s dinner. For whatever reason, his daughter has always been fond of the ‘villains’ being successful in her stories, and there’s never been a reason to discourage her.

“I like it when you tell stories best, Daddy…” She mumbles, already most of the way asleep as he closes the book and turns her small lamp off. “Love you…”

He leans in, unable to resist a final kiss to her forehead. “Love you, too. Now go to sleep, okay?”

She’s already mostly asleep when he leaves, shutting the door almost completely behind him.

Griffon sits at the kitchen table, two cups of coffee set out before her, a bottle of rum between them. She gives him a tired smile, taking a sip as he sits. “She fell asleep?”

“After only one story.” He agrees, lifting his own mug and taking a sip, fighting the urge to add more rum to it.

“Lucky you. She’s been giving me trouble lately.”

“Grif, I’m sorry I haven’t been home… This whole thing has just been…” He runs a hand through his hair, sighing and grabbing the bottle, adding another splash of rum to his coffee. He sees the way she raises her eyebrows, but she doesn’t say anything about it and neither does he. Instead, he continues on. “The game’s gotten a lot heavier all of a sudden. Nearly every data-protection job we go on, something is getting compromised… Michael almost died about a month ago—“ Her eyes widen, and he quickly shakes his head. “Well, not really, but… he was knocked out and he could have had his throat slit just as easily.”

“Maybe you should tone it down a little?” She suggests, already shaking her head at her own words. “No, the jobs are good, and you’re doing good work. Tell me what’s happening.”

Without meaning to, he finds himself explaining it to her, every last detail, even things he hasn’t voiced to his crew yet. The first job that failed utterly, the information being hacked and Michael knocked out and not a single person actually seen. The continued runaround, losing ground against the attackers. The way things had shifted suddenly as soon as Gavin came back, had been working steadily in their favor with the Brit’s return. And of course the way it had gone downhill again as soon as Gavin was called away for a personal matter.

Griffon frowns over her coffee—refilled twice since Geoff began talking—mulling over the words her husband has spoken. Finally, she reaches across the table, settling her hand on his. “You trust your crew completely, don’t you?”

“Of course.” Geoff can see in her eyes that she’s about to say something she knows he won’t like and he braces himself. If they know each other at all (and after so long together, he likes to think they know each other pretty damn well), she’s about to say exactly what he’s been thinking.

“I think… there are too many coincidences piled up. Too many shifts in behavior on both sides. It’s almost as if… as if someone were working for the other side.”

He shakes his head, sighing. “I’d considered it… I’d been one screwed up mission away from shoving them each into a room and seeing what kind of man they really were… But it just doesn’t add up. Even Gavin leaving, it doesn’t add up… Like, that first job, where Michael got knocked out. I had Jack do a little research after-the-fact, we figured out exactly what information was taken. He and I have kept an eye on the underside since then, and _that information never turned up_. It’s like they took it, but then never used it. Why wouldn’t they use it?”

Griffon is nodding, her teeth working over her lip. “You have a theory.” She finally says, settling her even gaze on him. “What is it?”

“I think that they’re working with changing numbers, just like us. We didn’t have Gavin and we lost the data. We lost Michael for a week and we lose even more—nothing as major as the first one, and those things showed up again in a couple of days. Suddenly we get Michael and Gavin back in action, it sends them into a scramble. But just that shouldn’t have been enough to stop them as completely as we did that first night Gavin was back. It’s like they were down a man, unable to keep track of our patrols and themselves. They were like that for a few weeks, and then suddenly, bam, they’re back to sending us chasing our own tails. It’s so weird.”

“Anything line up on the information side that could help confirm that?”

“Nothing concrete.” Geoff sighs, laughing softly. “The closest thing to evidence I have is that Gavin went back to England four days before they got organized again. But if it took them four days to adjust to us being a man down…”

“Maybe they were down a man during those four days, and he came back afterwards?” Griffon’s eyes are lighting up, the idea obviously sparking with her. It made a perfect kind of sense.

Geoff can’t help his smile, leaning over and kissing her lightly. “I considered it. Thanks, Grif.” At her confusion, he lifts a finger, tapping her lightly on the temple. “Letting me get it out there, voice my thoughts and organize them. You’re perfect for that, babe.”

She stands, moving around the table and wrapping her arms around him from behind, lips brushing his cheek. “Is that all I’m good at?”

His hands move up, wrapping around her as he grins wider. “Of course not. Come on, let’s good to bed… I think I need some of your other… special skills tonight.”

She laughs, swatting his shoulder and pulling away, but when he looks back to her, she’s standing in the doorway to their bedroom. One finger lifts, beckoning him forward. “Don’t waste time, then.” In a flip of short blonde hair she’s gone into the bedroom. Geoff drains his coffee, leaving his mug on the table and following her, taking only two brief detours.

The first is to his daughter’s room, making sure she’s still sleeping peacefully. He hesitates for a moment, smiling and fighting the urge to brush her hair from her face. No need to wake her up.

The second detour is to his computer, making sure that the complex security system he insists on having is armed and ready. Assured that it is, Geoff makes for his bedroom, meeting his wife in bed and forgetting, even for a little while, just how long it’s been since he’s done this.

–

He lies in bed after they’ve finished, warm and sated with the sheets around his hips and his wife’s head on his chest. She’s breathing evenly, almost asleep, and he’s moments away from chasing her into the dark peace of sleep. His eyelids are heavy, mind not focused on any particular thing.

Sharp focus comes when she speaks, voice barely a mumble. “Geoff…?”

“Yeah?” He questions, turning his head slightly, one arm lifting from its comfortable embrace of her to move her hair away from her face. She looks as if she’s asleep and is silent so long he wonders if she _did_ fall asleep, whatever question she had forgotten.

“Do you think…” She turns her head up slightly, meeting his gaze, “Gavin could be lying about England?”

He chuckles, leaning in to kiss her again, settling back against the pillow. “That kid’s too dumb to lie about his own name. He’s not a traitor.”

“A’ight…” Griffon agrees, drifting off to sleep quickly. Geoff looks her over, feels the way she fits so perfectly in his arms, and falls asleep with a smile on his lips.


End file.
